DIE-OFF, FISH - USA: (NEW HAMPSHIRE) ************************************ A ProMED-mail post <http://www.promedmail.org> ProMED-mail is a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases <http://www.isid.org>

There's a mystery brewing on Spofford Lake [New Hampshire], where hundreds of fish have turned up dead over the past 2 weeks.

Officials have no leads on the potential cause of the deaths, spanning several species of fish that have been washing up on the lake's shores since at least 16 Jun 2011, officials said Monday [27 Jun 2011].

"This time of year, there's typically nothing to be concerned about," said Gabriel Gries, a fisheries biologist for NH Fish and Game in Keene. It's actually quite common, Gries said, to find 20, 30, even 50 dead fish washing up this time of year due to natural causes.

"The fish are stressed from spawning; they're guarding their eggs; making nests," he said. "Then all of a sudden there's 3 or 4 days of really hot weather, which raises the temperature of the water, and the already stressed fish expire."

But this year [2011], there are a few unusual factors involved, Gries said. "The interesting thing here is that it's not 1 or 2 species," he said. "We've found yellow perch, bluegills, northern pike, large and small mouth bass, and bullhead catfish."

The discovery of dead bullhead catfish was particularly alarming, Gries said, because that species is normally quite resilient.

Fish and Game in Keene fielded nearly 30 calls about the dying fish since last weekend [25-26 Jun 2011], said executive secretary Pat B Hersom, which gave Gries reason to suspect something abnormal was occurring. "We went out and scoured the lake for any kind of sign of what might be happening, but found nothing," Gries said.

Fish and Game officials collected approximately 8 dead bluegills and one bullhead catfish, which were sent to the US Fish and Wildlife Service's Fish Health Center in Lamar, Pennsylvania, Gries said.

Officials hope to hear from the center about the test results later this week, Gries said. State officials are "in a holding pattern" until they learn more about the results, said Walter M Henderson, a biologist for the NH Department of Environmental Services.

"My 1st thought when I heard about it was that someone was using pesticides that got into the lake," Henderson said. "But (Gries) said it's not a point-source, so it's not limited to one part of the lake."

Based on the information at hand, Henderson said they're likely looking at some kind of fish disease.

Spofford Lake Association President Bayard F Tracy has been a resident on the lake since 2006, and said he's never seen anything like it. "This is a class A lake," he said. "It's very clean. Right now the lake looks as clean as it's ever been. Now we have a situation that's A, unusual, and B, continuing.

The appearance of tail or fin rot on the fish carcasses could provide some hint as to what the problem is, but there's no telling yet whether those symptoms occurred before or after the fish died, Gries said.

Tracy said the association tries hard to help people understand how their actions can affect the health and quality of the lake. "We tell them," he said. "Chemicals, lawn fertilizers ... the lake sits in a bowl, and it's spring-fed with a relatively small outlet, so it doesn't turn over a lot. Anything that gets in there will stay a while."

A longtime Spofford Lake resident said this year's [2011] fish die-off is the worst he's seen in 30-plus years. "My guess is it's 10 times more than normal (die-offs)."

Gries couldn't say exactly how many fish have died so far, but they number in the hundreds.

The association pays to have the lake water-tested 3 times a year, Wood said, with the most recent test having occurred 23 Jun 2011, according to Tracy. Those test results could be available as soon as next week, he said.

Meanwhile, the annual Independence Day fireworks [4 Jul 2011] display will proceed as planned Saturday [2 Jul 2011], Tracy said. "We also have the parade of boats on the 4th, but I don't expect either event to be affected by this," he said.

When it comes to swimming and fishing, officials said it's too soon to put up any caution flags. "It's up to individuals what they want to do," Tracy said. "I'm not going to push the panic button personally, not until we have the facts."

[While they wait on official tests to help determine the cause of the die-off, they need to be picking up the bodies of the fish that wash into the shore of the lake. If left around the shore the dead fish will be a perfect medium for botulism and then the problem could escalate. We look forward to the test results. - Mod.TG]

Glasgow, SCOTLAND - A tiny 'water boatman' insect is the world's loudest animal relative to its body size, according to a new study.

Males of the Micronecta scholtzi species serenade their sweethearts with a three-part song made by rubbing their genitalia against their abdomens, but it remains a mystery how or why the creatures make such a loud mating call.

"This insect is a few millimetres in length yet can produce sound audible from the riverside," says the study by scientists from France and Scotland, published by the PLoS ONE scientific organisation.

The song was recorded at noise levels up to 99.2 decibels, "a significant output considering the small size of the insect."

The water boatman outperformed marine and terrestrial mammal vocalisations, the researchers say.

"Such an extreme display may be interpreted as an exaggerated secondary sexual trait resulting from a runaway sexual selection without predation pressure," they said.

They admitted, however: "The mechanism behind the intense sound production of M. scholtzi is not clearly identified. There are no obvious body or external resonating systems that could amplify the sound.

"To observe the micro-mechanics of such a small system remains a significant challenge."

Micronecta scholtzi are freshwater insects measuring just 2mm that are common across Europe.

In terms of noise produced versus body size, the insect "is clearly an extreme outlier with a decibel to body size ratio of 31.5 while the mean is at 6.9 and the second highest value is estimated at 19.63 for the snapping shrimp S. parneomeris," the study said.

So far, the researchers have not yet managed to find out whether females of the species like their suitors' loud courtship calls.

Dr James Windmill from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, told the BBC: "We were very surprised. We first thought that the sound was coming from larger aquatic species such as a Sigara species [of] lesser water boatmen .

"When we identified without any doubt the sound source, we spent a lot of time making absolutely sure that our recordings of the sounds were calibrated correctly.

"If you scale the sound level they produce against their body size, Micronecta scholtzi are the loudest animals on Earth".

Paris, FRANCE  A study of kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) in the arctic region provides the first data on the migratory patterns of this seabird species and analyses its capacity to respond to environmental changes. The kittiwake is one of the most emblematic marine species of the arctic area, and evidence suggests that rising temperatures at the north pole over the coming decades will have a dramatic impact on populations of this bird.

To understand the responses of arctic species to climate change, an international team led by Thierry Boulinier (Centre for Functional and Evolutionary Ecology, CNRS, France), contributed to by the lecturer Jacob González-Solís, from the UB's Department of Animal Biology and the Institute for Research on Biodiversity (IRBio), has fitted tracking devices to individuals from several kittiwake populations in northern Norway.

The project is funded by the French Polar Institute (IPEV), the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA) and the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. During the research, the expert Víctor García, from the Ministry of the Environment and Rural and Marine Affairs, was involved in installing the satellite transmitters for tracking the tagged individuals.

The kittewake, which hibernates along the Cantabrian and Atlantic coasts of Spain, was considered until recently a dispersive species. For the first time, the use of geolocators and satellite transmitters has revealed that these birds have multiple migratory strategies and that ice affects their movements. The results show that after the breeding season, the entire population migrated to the Svalbard archipelago and to the eastern part of the Bering Sea to moult and recover from breeding effort. After two months, the birds took only nine days to migrate to the Labrador Sea, to the east of Greenland. Half of the population spent the winter in this area, but the other half moved towards the north-east Atlantic and even to the Iberian coast, before returning to the breeding grounds in February.

By comparing the data provided by the geolocators and satellite telemetry images of the Arctic ice, the experts found that the population studied migrated away from ice-covered areas. "Kittiwakes gather in areas where there is no ice," explains González-Solís. "If we consider that the volume of ice in the Arctic will decrease drastically over the coming decades, we are likely to see a general movement of hibernation areas northwards."

The satellite transmitters used in the study also provide key information on movements of individuals within populations. "The first results show that after breeding failure, kittiwakes move to breeding sites tens of kilometers away to find better breeding conditions," explains Boulinier. These movements indicate that the birds may respond to environmental changes more quickly than we thought.

The satellite transmitters also reveal the position of key conservation areas, where the kittiwakes congregate in large numbers to recover from breeding effort. This year, the project has been extended with the introduction of geolocators into several breeding colonies, for example in the Svalbard archipelago. It is hoped that over the next few years this new work will reveal the first changes in migration habits, distribution and population dynamics of kittiwakes in response to global warming.

UNITED KINGDOM  Many animals have eyes that are incredibly complex -- others manage without. Researchers at the University of Gothenburg have shown that sea urchins see with their entire body despite having no eyes at all. The study has been published in the scientific journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Most animals react to light and have developed a very sophisticated way of seeing complex images so that they can function in their surroundings. Good examples include insects' compound eyes and the human eye. Charles Darwin and other evolutionary biologists were bewildered by the eye's complexity and wondered how this kind of structure could have evolved through natural selection.

But some creatures, such as sea urchins, can react to light even though they do not have eyes. Previous studies of sea urchins have shown that they have a large number of genes linked to the development of the retina, which is the light-sensitive tissue in the human eye. This means that sea urchins have several genes that are coded for a widely occurring eye protein, opsin.

"It was this discovery that underpinned our research," says Sam Dupont from the University of Gothenburg's Department of Marine Ecology, one of the researchers behind the study and co-authors of the article. "We wanted to see where the opsin was located in sea urchins so that we could find the sensory light structures, or photoreceptors. We quite simply wanted to know where the sea urchin sees from."

The research group behind the study showed that the photoreceptors seem to be located on the tip and base of the tube feet that are found all over the sea urchin's body and are used to move.

"We argue that the entire adult sea urchin can act as a huge compound eye, and that the shadow that is cast by the animal's opaque skeleton over the light-sensitive cells can give it directional vision," says Dupont.

Miami, FL - University of Massachusetts Amherst scientist Andy Danylchuk rocked the flats-fishing world in May when he became first to document bonefish spawning behavior in the Bahamas.

The study, conducted in Eleuthera and published in the journal Marine Biology, described how the shallow-water speedsters gather in schools of more than 1,000 for a few days around the full and new moons from October to May, then head offshore to waters more than 1,000 feet deep to reproduce at night. Researchers took video of bonefish leaping out of the water like porpoises as they headed offshore and theorized this might be courtship behavior.

Fisheries scientists in South Florida long have believed that bonefish in Biscayne Bay and the Keys follow similar spawning behavior patterns but have yet to document it.

Which raises an interesting question about what captain Carl Ball and I witnessed on a Biscayne Bay flats fishing outing June 22.

The tide on the east side of Elliott Key when we arrived in late morning was low and just starting to come in. Ball, standing atop the poling platform of his skiff, spied a dark, mottled cloud in the water off a sandbar that extends from the island. Not knowing what to look for, anyone else probably would have mistaken it for tufts of sea grass on the bottom.

But Ball correctly identified it as a large school of bonefish milling around slowly back and forth along the island's edge in about five feet of water  some floating near the surface.

I made several casts of my 9-weight with Bahamas-like shrimp fly into the throng with no result. Each time the school would get close to the skiff, it would veer slowly away  but not panicking and remaining fairly close to shore.

Ball would pole the skiff from the fish to give them time to relax, then head slowly back to within casting range.

I cast my fly to the edge of the school as we got closer  and hooked a small, annoying jack. It's not unusual to find jacks mingling with bonefish.

After unhooking the jack and letting the bonefish settle down, Ball poled toward them once again. This time, I put the fly in the center of the school  which had to number into the hundreds  and was rewarded with squealing drag and disappearing line that quickly went into the backing.

At first, Ball feared it might be another pesky jack. But when it made a scorching 100-yard dash, we figured I finally had hooked the right species.

After about a 10-minute battle, I brought the bonefish close enough for Ball to grab, and he unhooked it and stuck it in his livewell.

Ball, a 10-year-veteran flats guide in the bay, tags his mostly fly-caught bonefish, tarpon and permit for scientific research conducted by Bonefish & Tarpon Trust and the University of Miami Rosenstiel School. This would be his 40th tagged bonefish of the year.

He got out his tagging gun and data sheet as I leaned forward to take photos of the process.

But when Ball lifted the bonefish from the well, it expelled a substance that could only be gametes onto the deck. It also sprayed the steering wheel.

We both assured the fish that we would make haste with the tagging process so that it could resume trying to get lucky. Ball injected a tag behind its dorsal fin and measured it  22&#8201;½ inches to the fork, estimated size: 6 pounds  then recorded the tag number and length on a sheet. He also made a note about the spawning fluid.

When Ball put the fish back into the bay, it bucked in his hands and pulled away before he could try to revive it. A healthy fish, and obviously eager to get back to what it was doing before it mistakenly ate the fly.

After that, we tried for permit, but that's another story.

The next day, I called Aaron Adams, Bonefish & Tarpon Trust director, to tell him what happened.

Adams said there have been anecdotes from the Bahamas of bonefish seen spawning into June, but the reproductive habits of South Florida fish still are unknown.

"I wouldn't call it a pre-spawning aggregation because it wasn't on the full or new moon," Adams said of the Elliott Key school of fish, which appeared the day before the third-quarter moon. "There could be some fish that might still spawn. Or there are some fish that are done spawning so they are reabsorbing the gametes. When you get into behavioral stuff like this, there's so much that could be going on."

For the sake of the bonefish (and those who take pleasure in stalking, catching and releasing them), I hope they spawn as often as they can. The species took a hit with the deep freeze of January 2010. Last fall's bonefish census conducted in Biscayne Bay and the Keys by scientists, anglers and guides showed a reduction in numbers. And no one knows how their larvae might have been affected by last year's BP oil disaster in the Gulf.

Torness. SCOTLAND - Both reactors at the Torness nuclear power station have been shut down after huge numbers of jellyfish were found in the sea water entering the plant.

The jellyfish were found obstructing cooling water filters on Tuesday.

The East Lothian plant's operator, EDF Energy, said the shutdown was a precautionary measure and there was never any danger to the public.

A clean-up operation is under way, but it is understood it could be next week before Torness is operational again.

Torness has two Advanced Gas Cooled Reactors but also relies on supplies of sea water to ensure it operates safely.

It has filters which are designed to prevent seaweed and marine animals entering the cooling system.

If these screens become clogged, the reactors are shut down to comply with safety procedures.

An EDF spokesman told BBC Scotland: "At no time was there any danger to the public. There are no radiological aspects associated with this event and there has been no impact to the environment."

Staff at the plant took the decision to shut down the reactors on Tuesday afternoon.

It is not known why there are so many jellyfish in the area.

Water temperatures along the east coast of Scotland have been relatively normal, but it is thought higher than average temperatures elsewhere in the North Sea may be a factor.

Operations at nuclear power plants in Japan have been disrupted by large numbers of jellyfish in recent years.

Earlier this month, an Atlantic Grey Seal was rescued from EDF Energy's Hinkley Point nuclear power station in Somerset after it got trapped in the inflow area chasing fish. The plant's operations were not affected.

The rainfall the last few afternoons has been a saving grace for the Caloosahatchee River. The toxic river has gone from the color and texture of pea soup. Now, the Army Corp of Engineers is releasing thousands of gallons of rain water down river - flushing out of the Franklin Lock in Alva.

It's work she says was long overdue because she hasn't been outside much in the past month.

The toxic algae has made it nearly impossible for her to breathe.

"It was horrible," she said.

But Wednesday, Buff's backyard looks different.

Where toxic algae once clumped in massive green and blue chunks, there remains just a sheen of emerald.

"It's still not very clear but at least we can see it's not that pea soup look we had before," she said.

Wednesday, we went to all the familiar spots we've visited in the past few weeks and we only found one noticeable algae bloom. That could be because the Army Corp. opened the Franklin Dam - dispelling 169,000 gallons per minute down the river.

And nobody is hoping for rain more than Jerome Allen.

He has been hired by the Army Corp of Engineers to scoop up the algae's victims  dead fish.

"Somebody's got to do it. I just get it and go and don't even think about it," he said.

He said on Wednesday, he only filled up one bucket with dead fish. He said that is down from three buckets a day last week.

But while the water looks remarkably better, Health Department officials say it may be months before it's safe for swimming and fishing.

The Health Department's next water quality test is scheduled for mid-July.

New York, NY  About 150 turtles crawled onto the tarmac at New York's Kennedy airport today in search of beaches to lay their eggs, delaying dozens of flights, aviation authorities said.

The slow-motion stampede began about 6:45 a.m., and within three hours there were so many turtles on Runway 4L and nearby taxiways that controllers were forced to move departing flights to another runway.

"We ceded to Mother Nature," said Ron Marsico, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which owns the airport.

Workers from the Port Authority and the U.S. Department of Agriculture were scooping up turtles and moving them across the airport, he said. Flight delays averaged about 30 minutes, the FAA said.

The migration of diamondback terrapin turtles happens every year at Kennedy, which is built on the edge of Jamaica Bay and a federally protected park. In late June or early July the animals heave themselves out of the bay and head toward a beach to lay their eggs.

The peak of the turtle trouble usually lasts a few days, Marsico said.

Several pilots, some of them stifling chuckles, began reporting turtles on Runway 4L just as the morning rush hour was beginning at JFK, according to a radio recording posted on LiveATC.net.

"Be advised 30 feet into the takeoff roll, left side of the centerline, there's another turtle," called the pilot of American Airlines Flight 1009, a Boeing 767 that had just taken off bound for the Dominican Republic.

"There's another one on the runway?" asked the controller.

"Uh, well he WAS there," the pilot said as the big airliner climbed into the air.

American 663, a Boeing 737 headed to Fort Lauderdale, found its way to runway 4L blocked by three of the roving reptiles. After ground crews removed them, the plane taxied into takeoff position, received takeoff clearance  and was promptly blocked by more turtles.

American and JetBlue, which has a hub at JFK, both said there were no major disruptions to their flights.

"We hope for faster animals next time," JetBlue said in a statement.

Female diamondback terrapins can grow up to 9 inches long and weigh up to three pounds.

Wayward wildlife is a serious concern at JFK and nearby LaGuardia Airport, which both sit on shorelines populated by geese, turtles, ducks, frogs and other animals. In January 2009 a U.S. Airways plane bound for Charlotte, N.C. was forced to land in the Hudson River after it hit a flock of birds and lost power in both engines. All 155 passengers and crew members were rescued.

In the past year, planes at JFK have collided with gulls, hawks, swans and an osprey, according to the FAA's database of wildlife strikes. In February, a superjumbo Airbus 380 flown by Emirates Airlines sucked an unidentified bird into one of its massive engines, causing about $30,000 worth of damage, the database shows.

"Other regions have their own issues with the runways, but this is kind of unique being so close to the water," FAA spokeswoman Arlene Salac said.

Road kill on runways can sometimes make them slippery, but there are no reports of turtles damaging a plane at JFK in recent years, the FAA database shows.

The main concern is for the turtles themselves, Marsico said. He said crews were loading the turtles into pickup trucks and giving them rides to the nesting beaches.

"We are trying to help wildlife out a bit here," Marsico said. "We built on the area where they were nesting for generations, so we feel incumbent to help them along the way."

DIE-OFF, CARP - USA (03): (MICHIGAN) ************************************ A ProMED-mail post <http://www.promedmail.org> ProMED-mail is a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases <http://www.isid.org>

The Department of Natural Resources [DNR] is investigating a fish kill of approximately 300-500 common carp in Kent Lake in Livingston County and in portions of the Huron River upstream of the impoundment.

"The fish kill started around [14 Jun 2011] and we have already collected samples to try to determine the cause," said Liz Hay-Chmielewski, DNR Fisheries Division Lake Erie Management Unit supervisor.

"This is a relatively small fish kill and there is no reason for anglers not to fish or boaters not to use this lake."

Fish kills at this time of year are usually associated with weather-related conditions, though occasionally they can be caused by pollution or improper use of herbicides or other chemicals. Disease is sometimes also a factor.

"It will take 2 to 4 weeks to get laboratory information back to allow us to understand what the cause of the fish kill could be," said Gary Whelan, DNR Fisheries Division's fish production manager.

"We want to remind anglers and boaters that they need to drain bilges and live wells upon leaving water, clean their boats and disinfect their gear, and not to move live fish in order to reduce the possibility of any fish diseases being transported from waterbody to waterbody."

The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is committed to the conservation, protection, management, use and enjoyment of the state's natural and cultural resources for current and future generations. For more information, go to <http://www.michigan.gov/dnr>.

[This may be a relatively small fish kill in the grand scheme of things and certainly ProMED-mail has reported on much larger situations. However what is appalling about this article is the length of time it takes for the laboratory to return results. While some testing takes some time, this kind of turn around time for results is way too long. What if this were a large fish kill or had human implications? What could be the consequences then?

We appreciate Michigan contacting us and look forward to the results.- Mod.TG]

[see also: Die-off, carp - USA (02): (MI) 20110625.1948 Die-off, carp - USA: (MI) 20110622.1907] .................................................tg/mj/jw/ll *##########################################################* ************************************************************ ProMED-mail makes every effort to verify the reports that are posted, but the accuracy and completeness of the information, and of any statements or opinions based thereon, are not guaranteed. The reader assumes all risks in using information posted or archived by ProMED-mail. ISID and its associated service providers shall not be held responsible for errors or omissions or held liable for any damages incurred as a result of use or reliance upon posted or archived material.

Wellington, NZ - An Emperor penguin found in New Zealand will be released into the ocean when fully fit so it can swim the 3,000 kilometres (1,900 miles) home to Antarctica, wildlife experts said Wednesday.

The penguin, nicknamed "Happy Feet", was found wandering on a beach near Wellington last week and was taken to the city's zoo when it became sick after eating sand and sticks.

After three rounds of surgery, including one performed by a top New Zealand surgeon, the zoo said Wednesday that its condition had stabilised and attention had turned to what would become of the unusual visitor.

A specially-formed "penguin advisory group", comprising experts from the zoo, Department of Conservation (DOC), Wellington's Massey University and the national museum Te Papa met Wednesday to decide its fate.

"The group has agreed the preferred option for the Emperor penguin is to release it in the Southern Ocean, southeast of New Zealand," DOC spokesman Peter Simpson said.

"This is the northern edge of the known range of juvenile Emperor penguins."

Simpson said other options canvassed included keeping the penguin in captivity, which was discounted due a lack of suitable facilities, and taking it back to Antarctica.

"The reason for not returning the penguin directly to Antarctica is that Emperor penguins of this age are usually found north of Antarctica on pack ice and in the open ocean," he said.

However, Wellington Zoo's veterinary manager Lisa Argilla said earlier this week that it could be months before the penguin was healthy enough for release because it was underweight following its long swim north and intestinal trauma.

In the meantime, the zoo said it would live in an air conditioned room carpeted with crushed ice to cool it in the relative warmth of New Zealand, where the mercury currently sits around 10 degrees Celsius (50 Fahrenheit).

It is thought the bird, only the second Emperor penguin ever recorded in New Zealand fell ill on the beach after mistaking sand for snow and eating it in a bid to lower its temperature, clogging its gut.

The Emperor penguin is the largest species of the distinctive waddling creature and can grow up to 1.15 metres (3ft 9in) tall.

The reason for Happy Feet's appearance in New Zealand remains a mystery, although experts say Emperor penguins take to the open sea during the Antarctic summer and this one may have simply wandered further than most.

FROGMEN The True Story of My Journeys With Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau and the Crew of Calypso By Richard E. Hyman In his personal account of expeditions with legendary French explorer Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau and the crew of research vessel Calypso, Richard Hyman takes us behind the scenes, inside the ship, and under the sea. In 1973, at the age of eighteen and just out of high school, he drives a truck from Los Angeles to the Canadian wilderness to work with Cree Native Americans building a cabin for the Cousteau team to winter in and film beavers. Subsequent journeys include diving in Florida's warm springs with manatees and off the panhandle with stone crabs. Months later he flies to Mexico's Yucatán and boards the Calypso, a relatively small and unsteady wooden ship, and camps on an uninhabited island to study lobsters. From there he sails south along the 180-mile Belize Barrier Reef, filming the spawning of thousands of grouper and a visit from singer songwriter John Denver. On his final voyage, en route to Venezuela, he experiences treacherous dives on the USS Monitor shipwreck off North Carolina, the death of Philippe Cousteau, and skeletons inside wrecks off Martinique, not to mention close encounters with pirates and drug smugglers.

FROGMEN is an inspiring adventure of a young man who pays homage to one of the greatest explorers and visionaries of all time.

Hello all. I'm not a marine biologist but have great interest in marine biology and nature and the environment in general.

When I was a young man (1973 - 1979) I had the opportunity to dive with Captain Jacques Cousteau. I kept journals and finally just recently put my self published book on the market.

I am interested in ways to get the word out so if you can suggest periodicals, bloggers, speaking opportunities, etc. please feel free, and of course please tell your friends. - I call it a simple true story. I'm of course biased but I do think it's a good read.

Many thanks! - Richard

FROGMEN

The True Story of My Journeys With Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau and the Crew of Calypso (available in paperback or downloadable via links below)

By Richard E. Hyman

In my personal account of expeditions with legendary French explorer Captain Jacques-Yves Cousteau and the crew of research vessel Calypso, I take the reader behind the scenes, inside the ship, and under the sea.

In 1973, at the age of eighteen and just out of high school, I drove a truck from Los Angeles to the Canadian wilderness to work with Cree Native Americans building a cabin for the Cousteau team to winter in and film beavers. Subsequent journeys included diving in Florida's warm springs with manatees and off the panhandle with stone crabs. Months later I flew to Mexico's Yucatán and boarded Calypso, a relatively small and unsteady wooden ship, and camped on an uninhabited island to study lobsters. From there I sailed south along the 180-mile Belize Barrier Reef, filming the spawning of thousands of grouper and a visit from singer songwriter John Denver. On my final voyage, en route to Venezuela, I experienced treacherous dives on the USS Monitor shipwreck off North Carolina, the death of Philippe Cousteau, and skeletons inside wrecks off Martinique, not to mention close encounters with pirates and drug smugglers.

FROGMEN is an inspiring adventure of a young man who pays homage to one of the greatest explorers and visionaries of all time.